Connie Reguli 8/25/21

Tennessee touts being number one in fiscal responsibility and super conservative with a super majority in our legislature. However, Tennessee is a super fail in child wellbeing.

The Children’s Bureau published a reports on many factors that affect child wellbeing on a daily basis, education, child removals, kids in foster care, and many more. A report is published called Child Maltreatment.

Tennessee ranks 39 out of the fifty states. 39. That is nothing to be proud of.

Tennessee DCS and Commissioner Jennifer Nichols stand in the way of improving child wellbeing in Tennessee. This is the most incompetent agency in the state of Tennessee and they are destroying children and families.

This report is even posted on the states website.

Sixteen indicators measuring four domains economic wellbeing, education, health, and family and community context are used by the Annie E. Casey Foundation in each year’s Data Book to assess child well-being. The annual KIDS COUNT data and rankings represent the most recent information available but do not capture the impact of the past year:

●        ECONOMIC WELLBEING: In 2019, one in five children lived in households with an income below the poverty line. Though higher than the national average, this percentage has decreased by 23% over the past decade.

●        EDUCATION: In 2019, 60% of young children were not in school. This percentage has remained consistent in Tennessee, fluctuating little throughout the last decade.

●        AFFORDABLE HEALTH CARE: In 2019[1] , 80,000 Tennessee children did not have health insurance. Many of these children may be eligible for TennCare or CHIP. The year prior there were 55,000 uninsured children in Tennessee were eligible for coverage through one of these programs.

●        FAMILY AND COMMUNITY CONTEXT: In 2019, Tennessee experienced one of the highest teen birthrates in the nation. Tennessee’s teen birth rate is 34% higher than the national average.

Survey data from the last year add to the story of Tennessee children and families in this moment:

●     During the pandemic, in 2020, 23% of adults in Tennessee with children in the household had little to no confidence in their ability to pay their next mortgage or rent payment. However, by March 2021, this figure had fallen to 13%, suggesting the beginnings of a recovery. Although confidence is increasing, Black or African American Tennesseans reporting a lack of confidence in 2021.

●     Tennessee has seen great improvement in children’s access to internet and digital devices for schooling. In 2020, more than one in five children did not have access. By 2021 that number has been reduced to 13%.

● Despite improving indicators, nearly in adults in Tennessee with children in the household reported feeling down depressed or helpless in 2021 a number remain unchanged since 2020.